When personal trainer CC Cunningham talks about group fitness, she isn’t referring to exercise classes. She means muscle groups.
“I recommend people pay attention to what I call the `Big Four’ large muscle groups: the chest, legs, back and abs,” said Cunningham, who is teaching exercise science classes this school year at the University of Illinois at Chicago while pursuing a doctorate in the study of human muscle movement. “You get the most out of your workouts with this strategy, whether you have five minutes or an hour.”
Bill Evans agrees. The longtime NASA adviser is a pioneering researcher in age reversal.
“People think big biceps and triceps mean they have big muscles, ” said Evans, who is director of the Nutrition, Exercise and Metabolism Laboratory at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences in Little Rock. “That’s just not the case.”
Truth is, Evans said, his numerous studies about exercise and aging focus on “moving around” muscles, such as the glutes (buttocks), hamstrings (back of the thigh) and quadriceps (front of the thigh). Strong glute and leg muscles mean more energy and fewer pounds.
Cunningham said that “many guys tend to overlook the legs,” while women focus more on “hip mass” than working the large muscle groups, which would address the hip girth by burning more calories in the entire body.
Just how you can find time for physical activity might be a challenge, so targeting large muscle groups can seem out of reach. Here are some suggestions for doing both–and feeling better:
Back muscles
Cunningham said a “Superman” pose while lying on the floor is effective for the entire group of muscles in the upper and lower back. Place your arms out in front of you at if you are flying. Hold for a count of 5.
Repeat for a set of 10. Seriously.
Pulling exercises are good for the back muscles. At the gym, try seated or bent rowing exercises. Or you can purchase a relatively inexpensive exercise ball (about beach ball size) and squish the ball into your chest to “fire up all of the back muscles,” Cunningham said.
Glutes
Rather than make this muscle group the butt of jokes, find minutes in your day to tone the gluteus maximus. The squat is the best exercise, and it doesn’t require weight or much time to produce results.
Begin a squats regimen without weight (typically a barbell across the back of the shoulders). Cunningham suggests holding on to a kitchen counter or couch back straight in front of you while squatting at–this is important–no more than a 90-degree angle formed by the lower leg and thigh (which should be parallel to the floor).Keep your back straight and your weight squarely over the heels. Start with one set of 12 squats, then progress to three sets every other day before trying it with weights or resistance.
“What’s great about the squat is it is sort of a `two-fer’ because it also works the hamstrings [back of the thighs],” Cunningham said.
Leg muscles
Walking and climbing stairs are ideal daily activities to build the leg muscle groups of the hamstrings and quadriceps (front of the thighs). Start modestly, graduate to 20 to 30 minutes a day at a pace that simulates how you walk when late for an appointment. Taking the stairs is a superior calorie-burning movement; you get the most benefit when not holding on to the railing, Evans said.
Along with squats, the lunge is a direct-hit exercise for the legs, especially the hamstrings. Again, start without weights. Don’t go beyond a 90-degree angle with the front leg. Many trainers warn not to get the knee out in front of the toe. Cunningham said a better approach is finding the proper front foot placement so by default your leg will never bend more than 90 degrees.
One repetition is lunge right, then lunge left. Do 12 reps for one set. Over weeks, work your way to three sets.
Chest muscles
Surprise, both Cunningham and Evans said the old-fashioned push-up is the state-of-the-art method for building your chest muscles, especially the pectorals. “I call them `empowerment exercises,'” Cunningham said. “You are moving your own body weight.”
You can start a push-ups program in the modified position (knees on the floor, feet up off floor but not crisscrossed) or classic position. Palms are shoulder-width. In his new book, “AstroFit” (Free Press, $24), co-authored with Gerald Secor Couzens, Evans recommends slowly lowering your torso to the floor on a six-count of “one-thousand, two-thousand,” etc. Don’t hold your breath on the way down. Touch your mat with your chest on the sixth second, then pause one second and come back up on a two-count.
Cunningham suggests a first goal of 10 push-ups, modified or classic. Once it becomes easy to do the first set, then work your way to three sets every other day. After that, rather than increase quantity, she said, the next step is the bench press using a barbell, dumbbells or machine.
Abdominal muscles
The ab crunch is still the favorite among trainers. If you can perform more than 20 crunches per set, you are not isolating the abs, instead recruiting the back, chest, glutes and legs to do some of the work.
Start with the back completely on the floor, knees comfortably bent. Gently press your back into the floor. Hands across the midsection, move just high enough to lift shoulder blades off the floor, then back down until shoulders slightly brush the floor. The pelvis holds still throughout the movement. When performing the crunch, feel the tension from the top to bottom of the abs. Three sets of 20 is your gold standard.
